It Is What It Is
by Kaelir of Lorien
Summary: Faced with the test of faith after three long years, John falters and leaves Baker Street. As Sherlock attempts to weather the aftermath, he has nothing left but to throw himself headlong into the final hunt for Sebastian Moran - and in one crucial moment, John is not there. John must turn and face himself if he is to rediscover what the strength of their friendship really means.
1. Part I: Lacking

**Author's Note: **Post-Reichenbach, this piece takes place shortly after Sherlock's return from his three-year hiatus, during which he was occupied with exterminating the most dangerous remnants of Moriarty's web. For John, however, I maintain my belief that the abrupt transition is far from easy. It's time for our good doctor to make a decision, and made it he has. I warn you: this will not be a happy story.

And yes, this will be a multi-chapter fic.

Enjoy, and as always, I thank you for reading and for taking the time to leave your thoughts. :)

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**It Is What It Is**

_Part I: Lacking_**  
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Sometimes, despite all the efforts of strength and need and desperation, there is no way to fully heal a rift. It is a losing battle from the start, because the faith has been lost for too long; and without faith, there can be no trust in the other and no hope for moving beyond the point of separation. Faith is a thing of the heart, not the mind. For a heart that has been torn open, and that has subsequently grown a thick, encasing wall to hide and protect the gap, faith can be the hardest thing of all.

Such it was with John Watson. He was a man who, at not even forty years of age, had already had a lifetime of building walls and erecting barriers—things that would protect his heart and his mind from the worst of the circumstances that his profession had to offer. Anyone in his position who could not do this was mad, and would likely go mad because of it. Even the most hardened in the medical profession could only endure so much, and they were hardened because of their very ability to recognise and define their own limits.

This was not to say that John was not a compassionate individual, because he was, and very much so. But he also knew exactly when a calm, rational, and disciplined demeanour was absolutely vital, and understood how to shut himself off, at least for a time, from the emotion that would compromise his skills both as a soldier and as a doctor.

Sometimes, though, John found himself wishing that this ability wasn't quite so automatic—that he could turn away from it just a little more easily.

He had a terrible, hollow feeling that he shouldn't be using it on his best friend.

_It's not going to be quick_, he kept telling himself, at first. _It's not going to be easy. It's been a long time, so _give_ it time. It'll work out. It'll be OK._ And for that first week, he had managed to ignore what he was only starting now to notice: that he was avoiding Sherlock, finding excuses to be in another room or indeed out of the flat altogether, and instead of dropping his mental barriers and telling Sherlock exactly what was going through his mind, he found himself putting up more—even strengthening them, damn it—and the worst part was, he didn't regret it in the slightest. At least, not until he thought about it. Then it was more guilt than regret, and he became angry not only at his flatmate, but at himself for being too much of a coward to admit to anyone _including _himself that he had hit that final wall of his endurance.

He knew his silence was hurting them both. Sherlock acted like nothing was wrong, of course, but John had caught him looking once or twice out of the corner of his eye, and there had been a glimmer of pain there, something dark and quickly-buried.

And then he had looked at himself in the mirror one morning, and the hard, tight, and distant face that looked back at him was not the John Watson he remembered.

It was then, that moment, that he knew this had to stop.

Easier said than done, a little voice in his head kept reminding him, and it was true; he did cringe inwardly at the thought that he was going to have to tell Sherlock what his subconscious had decided almost from the very start of their new-found relationship—that three years was too long. That the rift Sherlock had created between them by his death and by his absence, no matter how selfless his intentions, was still there, and would be for a very long time, and no matter how deeply John struggled with himself, the nightmares would not retreat.

He went to Mrs Hudson first, in what he convinced himself was a tactful decision even though he knew deep down he was only stalling for time. Quietly, over a steaming mug of tea that she had forced between his hands, he explained what he meant to do.

"Oh, but surely you can work it out, dear," she replied immediately, gazing worriedly at him across the tiny kitchen table in the downstairs flat. "Sherlock's never been easy to live with, we all know that, but you've always done better than—"

"It's—not working." John's voice was halting as he shook his head, and he couldn't quite meet her eyes. "I've tried, Mrs H, really I have, but it's just not..."

He found himself trailing off without really knowing where he was headed, and shut himself up again with another large gulp of tea that burned his tongue and throat as it went down. His fingers were probably burning a bit too; he had not released his grip on the mug since it had been given to him. He found that he didn't really care at the moment.

Mrs Hudson, bless her, kept trying all the same. "But these things take time, John."

"Some things," John corrected her immediately. "It doesn't always work that way. And in this case—it's not going to."

"Are you sure, dear, there's nothing you can—?"

But John shook his head again, and looked back into his mug.

She watched him for a long, trembling moment, running one hand sadly up and down the side of her thin, careworn face. Then her eyes softened, and he suddenly knew that she understood, at least partially, how difficult this was for him, and how much it had taken for him to admit, even to her, that he had actually given up.

"You've both changed so much," she murmured softly. "Sometimes I think—" She broke off, and John gave her an odd, questioning look.

"You think what?"

Mrs Hudson waved the query away, as though it was of no importance. "No, no, it's just me having a few silly thoughts, is all," she said quickly. "Nothing for you to worry your head about."

John, however, had developed a warm, genuine respect for the intuition of this seemingly-fragile woman, and it seemed that every once in a while she would demonstrate, very quietly, by word or action, that she, too, had eyes and ears just like Sherlock, and could sometimes see even the things that he would miss. With a fond smile, John reached over and touched his landlady's hand. "No, you can tell me," he encouraged quietly. "I won't be offended if it's something about me or Sherlock, I promise."

"Well..." He watched as she fixed her gaze on the bottom edge of the refrigerator. "It's only that sometimes I look at you both, and it's—it's almost like you've changed places, since Sherlock came back."

John went very still, trying to identify the strange rolling of emotions her soft words had suddenly evoked. "What d' you mean, changed places?"

She let out a shaking, embarrassed little laugh. "Oh, but that _is_ a silly thought, isn't it?"

"What? No..." he assured her absently, "no, it's not. Trust me."

"Well, I've noticed," Mrs Hudson went on, in a hesitant, slightly shaking voice, "that you've gone a bit—well, a bit _distant_ since he's been back, John dear. You don't talk much, and it's so quiet upstairs I keep asking myself if they've both gone out somewhere, except—"

"—except that we haven't gone anywhere," John finished for her softly, and he was becoming aware of a slight ache in his head—or was it his heart?

She nodded. "And it's just it used to be Sherlock who locked himself up in his own head, you remember."

"And... you're saying it's me, now, doing that."

"Oh, well," she fluttered, "not quite like that, of course..."

But she did mean it like that, and they both realised it. John was suddenly becoming aware that this, _this_ was exactly what had been bothering him this whole time, only he had never been quite able to put it into words, because it had never occurred in his wildest thoughts that he could possibly be becoming anything like Sherlock. They had always been different, hadn't they? People called them opposites, even; on the one hand, there was Sherlock—brilliant, erratic, calculating—and on the other there was John—the steady, patient, and practical doctor who just happened to have a military background that encouraged a life outside the ordinary.

And yet, here now was Mrs Hudson, probably the one person closest to them both, telling John in her soft and reluctant voice that she could see a shadow of Sherlock Holmes in _him_. Mentally, John flinched back from the idea. It was uncanny; it was frightening. There were sides of Sherlock that John never had and never would like, and that sort of personal isolation was one of them.

It was with a slightly stricken feeling that he looked away again—out the window, at the floor, anywhere—but at the same time, he could hardly deny what his instincts had been trying to tell him for days now just because someone had finally had the courage to say it out loud. What _he_ could say to that was another problem entirely, and he didn't have an answer.

"He came down and visited me, you know," Mrs Hudson ventured, gently clearing her throat.

John swung his head around to regard her incredulously. "Sherlock?"

She nodded. "It was—Thursday—I remember because I'd just done the floors in here and out in the hall, and when I came back there he was, sat in here like he'd just appeared instead of coming down the stairs where I should have seen him."

Despite the ensuing pause, John didn't interrupt. A quiet combination of confusion and guilt was pressing gently at the edges of his consciousness as he listened, for this was not normal Sherlock behaviour. He could think of any number of reasons why his friend would pop downstairs, but none of them included sitting quietly and waiting for Mrs Hudson to return from one of her regular bouts of cleaning. Sherlock could just have easily caught a word with her in the hall, but he had chosen not to, and John felt a small pang as he realised why that must have been.

"I could tell something was on his mind, you know, but he didn't say a word for the longest time... just kept looking all around while I made a cuppa." Mrs Hudson's pale forehead was wrinkled in thought. "And I thought, oh, this is very strange. I don't think I've ever seen him look like that before. Almost _lost_, it was."

John let out a long, slow breath. "Lost?" he repeated quietly. "Why—lost?"

Her eyes blinked apologetically back at him. "I think it was you, dear." She sounded very much as though she would have liked to hold the words back, but at the same time, John thought he detected the barest note of gentle reproof. "He's trying, you know, John. I think it just doesn't show as much—but that's the way he's always been, isn't it? He's not about to tell you or me or anyone, but he is trying. I can see it."

"Then why did he bother coming down here, if he's always so closed-up?" John asked, feeling it odd to be reaching in such desperation for answers about his own best friend.

"Because, love, he doesn't understand what's happening. He's only a child in some ways, after all."

As another throbbing ache felt its way into his chest, John abruptly closed his eyes and dropped his head into his hands. This was exactly what he had been afraid of, if he was honest with himself: losing Sherlock to something of the detective's own making, and watching helplessly as their friendship swayed and buckled and slowly gave way to something far colder. It was as though even through death, Moriarty's ultimate scheme was reaching for them, twisting them apart. When John next spoke, his voice was muffled against his palms and fingertips.

"And that's exactly why I have to leave."

He heard a light breath escape her lips before she asked, very quietly, "Are you sure, dear, that's not exactly why you should be staying with him?"

"No—_no_—it's just the opposite—" John's head shot up again, and as he looked at her, he could feel his eyes burning with all the memories and all the trials and all the things he knew he was about to let fall to the earth behind him. "It's not going to work, Mrs H, it just isn't. I'm sorry—I wish it could happen some other way—but we've both said too much, and—and not said enough—and it needs to stop before it gets completely out of control."

"Alright, dear," she whispered. "If that's really how you feel about it"—and the soft disappointment in her voice cut through him like knife.

He didn't remain long after that. Sherlock had gone out by the time he returned upstairs, for which he did not complain. How long he sat there in the darkening room, he never remembered, for the minutes and hours ticked thoughtlessly on, and still, _still_, he could not think of how he was going to tell Sherlock.

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_Thank you kindly for taking the time to read! Any thoughts, comments, or suggestions you could offer are very much appreciated. :)_


	2. Part II: Ending

**Author's Note: **Thanks very kindly to those who have left their comments so far. The story is developing as my mind sees fit, which means it could quite possibly take a turn even I don't anticipate! However, I'm having a lot of fun writing it and getting into John's head, and I hope that shows through.

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_Part II: Ending_

It was after midnight by the time Sherlock returned to Baker Street, and even then, John never would have noticed if he hadn't been checking out the window every ten minutes or so.

He wasn't sure when he had expected Sherlock to be back, or even if he had thought about it at all, but slowly a gnawing anxiety had begun to form somewhere in the pit of his stomach, and it had grown steadily as the hours flickered by until it was so distracting that John could no longer sit still. He had taken to pacing up and down the room—first in front of the hearth, then the sofa, then back toward the kitchen—running one hand over his short-cropped hair as he did so. It didn't help a whole lot, but at least it served as a distraction for a while—more than could be said about sitting silently and broodingly in an armchair for the entire night, which was what it had started to look like he would be doing.

Every so often, he would cease his pacing, turn sharply on his heel, and make his way to the window, where he would draw back the thin curtain and scan the street and the pavement below for any sign of his flatmate (he tried not to think _soon to be former_ flatmate at this point, but the thought intruded all the same). Most every time, nothing had changed, and except for a lone car rolling down the street, all was quiet.

It was still quiet, though, when John again approached the window above the cafe and spotted the tall, dark-coated figure with its crown of curls that could only be Sherlock. There was something odd going on, though; instead of crossing the street with the usual brisk stride, the detective had remained on the opposite pavement. He was facing away from the flat, and his head was bent low over something in front of him.

John frowned, absently running his tongue over the back of his teeth in thought. He wasn't sure what was going on, but now that he considered it, Sherlock had actually been quite active the past few days.

Indeed, now that he looked, there was no doubt about it. Sherlock was up to something.

Preoccupied with his own dismaying mindset, John had paid little attention that past week to the fact that Sherlock was, in fact, out of the flat quite a lot, and much of the time during the hours of darkness. He had never mentioned where he was going, or why, but as John thought back, he recalled a look of grim frustration on the detective's face each time Sherlock had returned, as though whatever object he had been pursuing had slipped through his fingers. How he was avoiding the public and especially the press, John didn't know. He had not bothered to inquire further, for he had assumed that with their present status, initiating questions of that sort were bound to have a negative conclusion, in the end, and that wasn't any conversation he was anxious to become involved in. There was enough negativity in the air already; he could practically feel it vibrating around the flat, seeping its way under doors and through walls, permeating his very breath with its heavy flow.

It was a terrible thought, but John was beginning to suspect that staying at Baker Street was more than partially responsible for the sickening feeling he was getting more and more often in the pit of his stomach, and the sooner he left...

Well, he would find out soon enough what would happen then.

He continued to watch, with a sort of dark curiosity, the furtive movements of his friend across the street. Only when Sherlock turned, and another, smaller figure slipped into view beside him, did John begin to have an inkling of what was going on, and even then, he wasn't at all sure of the specifics of it. Unobtrusively, he twitched the curtain back a little further.

The boy Sherlock was talking to was a teenager—probably about fifteen, John decided, and he furthermore concluded that this must be one of the many links in the detective's homeless network, for the kid was dressed in dark, worn clothes that were rather too big for him, and his body underneath looked very thin to John's doctor's eyes despite the baggy garments. There was something tough about him, too; he was giving Sherlock what appeared to be a fairly exasperated look, and folded his arms over his lean torso a moment later, shaking his head. Then something exchanged hands—cash, John thought, with a roll of his eyes—and Sherlock muttered a last word before turning away. Behind him, the boy drew his too-long jacket closer about his body and vanished into the shadow at the edge of the pavement.

Sherlock had a black look on his face as he swept into the flat a minute later, tugging his scarf off with one irritated movement and flinging it carelessly over the back of a chair. The long coat met a similar fate, tossed without ceremony in the vicinity of the sofa, where John then watched it slide slowly to the floor. Sherlock didn't seem to notice; he had begun pacing agitatedly back and forth in front of the window, fingertips pressed to his lips and a frown of utter concentration on his face.

John drew a slow breath. "What was all that about, then?"

There was a slow murmuring sound coming from somewhere in the room. It took him a moment to realise that it was a steady stream of undertone muttering issuing from Sherlock's lips.

"Sherlock—"

The pacing stopped, so abruptly that John felt a strong inclination to take a step backwards himself. Sherlock's gaze fixed on him, and for a moment it was full-force, stark and piercing, and John could see in his friend's eyes the wary, lingering question: What had caused him to break the silence they'd been living in the past few days?

"All what?" the detective asked, his tone soft and deliberate.

John swallowed and waved a hand briefly toward the window. "All that," he repeated. "You were talking to that kid—one of your network, is he?"

"Yes..." Sherlock was still watching him with that intent, thoughtful look.

"Yeah, okay, so...?"

An uncomfortable silence settled between them, for much longer than John thought he could stand, but he was quickly running out of prompts that might get Sherlock talking. Yet a moment later Sherlock seemed to unfreeze as if a button had been pressed, and he went on as though only a few seconds had passed since John's last words, "Anthony. He's been keeping an eye on something for me—very useful under the circumstances."

John frowned. "Under which circumstances—?"

This time, Sherlock raised a significant eyebrow at him, but didn't respond.

"Ok, look," John hurried on, frustrated, letting the words tumble out before he could regret them, "we need to talk, Sherlock." Only at the last second did his eyes flick upward to meet his friend's, afraid of what he might see there.

Slowly, Sherlock's hands lowered and drifted to clasped position behind his back. "Yes," he said softly, "yes, I've begun to think the same."

"Have you?" That was a bit of a surprise.

"Of course."

"What d'you mean, 'of course'?"

"I mean it's become increasingly obvious that our current situation is bothering you in some way, and since the only remaining avenue seems to be a discussion of that, logically—"

"For God's sake, leave your analysis out of this, just for once!" John broke in loudly. With a sharp intake of breath to steady himself, he turned his head to face Sherlock squarely. "Do you _actually_ understand why we need to talk?"

There was another long silence, during which Sherlock looked quietly back at him, not moving and not speaking, as though he were fighting some soft, desperate internal struggle and was determined not to let it show even the slightest on his features. And then, haltingly, clearly puzzled by the unfamiliarity of it—"No."

John let his disappointment dissolve into the air with one slow exhale. "I didn't think so."

"Will you explain?"

A simple question. Such a simple question, but everything in the room seemed to go still, and for a few seconds, John closed his eyes, wishing he could have somehow avoided hearing that note in Sherlock's voice that told him Mrs Hudson had been right, after all.

_Lost_. That was how she had described it, and that was exactly what it was.

"I'm..." John rubbed a hand over his face as he listened to his own heart thudding hollowly inside his chest. "I'm not sure I can."

"I don't understand."

"I know—I _know_—you don't, Sherlock, I know—"

"John—"

"No, it doesn't work—it's not that _easy_—"

He felt as though the fractured conversation was multiplying tenfold in his mind; he could hear his own voice protesting over and over and over again, and Sherlock's uncomprehending _John, John, John..._ echoing in the midst of it—soft, sombre bell-tones overlaid with the detective's constant need to understand. Only, he couldn't, not this time, and was there really any point in trying to explain when everything was about to fall to pieces anyway—

"John."

Wasn't it odd, the way that one word, his own name, could cut through such a churning sea of struggle and desperation? It stopped him short, as though for a split second he could hear nothing else but Sherlock's voice calling him, bringing him back from the brink of some wild and crumbling ledge he had hardly dared contemplate but had found himself upon anyway. A sharp intake of breath passed with a sudden hiss of shock through his lips, and then the words were out before he could even think exactly what he was bringing down upon them both:

"I have to go," he said.

Confusion moved like a cloud over Sherlock's face. "Go?" he repeated, still in that horrible uncertain tone that was so unlike him. John hated hearing it. "Go... go where? You said only a minute ago we needed to talk."

"No, I mean—" John bit his lip, shaking his head for a few seconds in a mute appeal that he knew would not make the slightest difference now. He drew another breath, but it was shivering this time. "I mean," he forced out again, "I have to leave."

The moment that followed seemed like a lifetime; it passed only with agonising slowness, somehow caught out of time and context and stretching, it seemed to John, from one edge of his known life to disappear into a haze of uncertainty at the other end. A bridge that he had crossed, and even if he looked back now, it would dissolve beneath his feet should he take a step backward in guilt or regret.

Yet still, Sherlock was staring at him. "When you say _leave_..."

"You know what I mean," interrupted John, very quietly. "I know you do."

And then they looked at each other, their eyes meeting slowly and fearfully and reluctantly, and John had never felt as much distance between them as he did now, not even when he had stood rooted to the pavement and looked up to the figure silhouetted dark and tall against the greying sky on the edge of the hospital roof. That had been a separation thrust abruptly upon them, a moment of futile pleas in a barely-controlled whirlwind of panic, a careful plan set into motion by Sherlock himself, but this, this was something else entirely.

This was the distance brought on by distance itself. This was _I can't_ and _too late_ and _it's time_. This was desperation, severing the last strand, quitting while ahead.

This was John, not Sherlock.

A spasm of emotion flickered across the detective's face, so subtle that John wouldn't even have noticed had he not been expecting it. _I'm sorry_, he wanted to say, _I'm sorry, Sherlock, and I know you still don't get it..._

"Why, John?" asked Sherlock in a whisper, shaking his head almost imperceptibly as though trying to dash a fog from his senses. "You can't be seriously considering—"

"I'm not considering, I've considered, and I can't do this anymore." John's own voice was just as soft.

"Can't do what? No, John, what you can't do is simply walk away when—"

"Sherlock, I have to."

"—when you still haven't explained—"

"Because you were too _late_."

Clearly startled by his friend's cold and sudden response, Sherlock stopped short. His gaze flicked from side to side, taking in the resolute expression that had formed, stone-like, on John's face, and then his pale lips parted to release one questioning word into the room. "Late?"

"Yes," John confirmed in a fierce undertone, "late. That's what I said. You were late. Three years was too late—or do you still not get that?" He lifted his head slightly, defiantly. "If not, I'm telling you right now: you missed your chance. If you wanted everything to be just the same, you shouldn't have waited, you shouldn't have made _me_ wait, and for God's sake, you shouldn't have done what you did in the first place."

Sherlock shook his head again, in that same shudder of confusion. "John," he repeated, "I told you all that, I _explained_ exactly why everything had to be arranged just as it was—"

"That doesn't _matter_!" John broke in, choking a little on the words as his throat began to constrict. He wasn't going to be able to take much more of this. "It's not important whether it was right, or necessary, or whether you did it for me or Mrs H or Lestrade or anyone else, because the point is, you still did it, and even if you're over it, I'm not, and I can't—" He cut himself off abruptly.

Some inner sense of control seemed to reassert itself just in time, saving him before he could take that one step off the brink of rationality. Now, he drew a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and met Sherlock's eyes with a gaze that was steady and unflinching.

"No," he said. "I have to leave."

He thought he saw the detective's eyes widen fractionally.

"Don't." Sherlock's voice sounded as though it were reflecting some point of stability inside of him, one that was now slowly crumbling under the realisation that John meant every word he said. "Please."

And it was so hard to turn away, to see that shadow passing over his friend's face because of _him_, but John forced himself to remain unwavering.

"Sherlock... I'm sorry."

Clenching his jaw, he turned away; and by the next afternoon, he was gone. Sherlock stood silently and expressionlessly at the window, and only when the cab had disappeared from view with John Watson inside it did he let the curtain fall gently from his fingertips.

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_Again, thank you for taking the time! Any comments or suggestions you might have, on what's here or what you might like to see, are always greatly appreciated. :)_


	3. Part III: Breathing

**Author's Note: **Once again I send my sincere thank to all those who have added this piece to their favourites or their alerts, and most of all to those who have reviewed. You people do make my day with your comments! This is still sort of a new undertaking for me, delving into this sort of scenario, so the support is very much appreciated. Please enjoy this latest chapter! :)

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_Part III: Breathing_

Later, John thought that night was probably the longest of his life.

At first, it came as a surprise to him—to stare blankly across the darkened little room with his knees drawn up and his hands interlaced forcibly in front of them, to breath slowly and softly and painfully and realise he had never been hurting so much, in this way. This felt so strangely, incredibly wrong, and not just because he was actually in pain, but because he had never stopped to consider that it would be like this. It should have been Sherlock's death that put him through the most pain. That's how it should have worked; that's what all his rational senses were telling him should have been the case.

But it wasn't.

He bit his lip, huddling further back against the pillow he had propped up parallel to the headboard. The darkness was pressing in on his eyes like a living thing, heavy and smothering, and he kept blinking as though that would somehow force it away. But the pressure remained, pushing at him, drowning him. It was not so much a feeling of vulnerability as it was one of silent hopelessness.

Why, _why_ was this suddenly so much worse? Sherlock was alive, for God's sake. He was alive, he was alright—

_Because this is different, isn't it?_ said a soft, muffled voice in his head. _This is _your_ fault, John Watson, and this time you can't pin the blame on a dead man. _

And however much he tried to twist and writhe his way out of the truth in that statement, he always came up face-to-face with it again. This had been his move and his alone, and no matter what the impetus might have been—Sherlock, mostly—John was still the only one who had any claim to the ultimate responsibility, and he could, in the end, blame no one but himself for the fact that there was now only one man sitting by a dying fire in the darkness at Baker Street.

He bowed his head until it came slowly to rest against the tops of knees, feeling an argument brewing within himself. He'd become so used to the idea that Sherlock was gone. He doubted it had showed; for a while, he had kept up a very convincing charade, even to himself, that he still retained some measure of denial that Sherlock was really dead and some hope of the detective's eventual return. But by the second year, he hadn't really believed it, and by the third, he had struggled onward with his life and found that John Watson wasn't quite as broken as he'd thought himself to be.

The idea of acceptance had unfolded very slowly, to be sure, but John was not a man who could have gone on indefinitely like that—drifting without purpose from one place or one person to the next, letting himself fade and slowly dissolve into the chill of his own grief. It went against all that he was to give in to a state of darkness without a fight. A soldier didn't just lay down his arms and his life when he became tired; he plunged onward through it, firm, tight-lipped, and would keep going until he dropped.

John didn't drop. He didn't _fall_. With a calm and a determination that surprised even himself, he fumbled his way through the fog and emerged, blinking, into a world that hadn't changed as much as he'd expected.

There was an odd sort of comfort in that; and throughout it all, even though he was barely aware of it, he was letting Sherlock take the blame for the things that had happened, and in doing so, was releasing the heaviest weight of all into the earth to be held in keeping by a man who didn't mind in the slightest. That time, the burden of guilt had not been John's to bear.

Now, though—now it was. He had done this to them both, had _hurt_ them both, and try as he might to convince himself that he had made the right decision, the thought still lingered that he had missed something. For a moment, he felt as he thought Sherlock must when the detective knew something was amiss but was pacing in a frantic, agitated circle because he couldn't for the life of him recall exactly what that something was. Only, here, it was John's heart that was pacing the circle, and every beat was like an echo of the last except faster, harder, as though it were trying without success to force him in the right direction, and yet he could only stand there with his hands outspread in complete incomprehension, and he knew by the time he figured it out it would be far too late.

Clenching his teeth, John weighted his forehead further against his knees, until he could feel the aching pressure spreading along the ridge of his skull. This wasn't helping. Maybe he just needed to stop _thinking_, before it really started messing with him.

"I had to," he breathed into the darkness. "I had to do it." Already it seemed like the conviction was dropping from his voice. "I had to leave."

The darkness made no response. What did it care if there was one more lonely, tired man who was afraid he'd made a mistake? It had seen many of them.

John knew he had made the right decision—for himself. What he couldn't be sure of was that the choice had been the right one for Sherlock. It wasn't easy to forget that look on the detective's face when he'd realised how much in deadly earnest John was. When it had hit him that it didn't actually take lies or Moriarty or death to separate them. All it took was a few words spoken and heard in the quiet that was only the eye of the storm.

_Stop thinking about it_. John closed his eyes, counted to four softly under his breath, willed himself to let it go and let it be, because there was nothing he could do about it now. He knew he wouldn't be going back; that wasn't even a factor. What _did_ worry him was the uncertainly, and not knowing how long he would have to guard himself from his own emotion.

_Sherlock—I'm sorry. You'll be okay. I promise._

It was a very long time before sleep finally claimed him that night; until then, he sat motionless on the bed, staring into the darkness, counting to four over and over again until he could fill all his thoughts with simple, uncomplicated numbers. And it was only in the moments before he sank into unconsciousness that he began to wonder if he even had a right to make that promise.

Maybe he didn't. Not anymore.

* * *

Out of the darkness of a second floor window came the hesitant strains of a violin.

The notes were long and quiet, but for all their beauty, it was the reluctance that echoed most from the instrument. There was a fragility to the music, soft and thin, as though each note was only as strong as the slimmest shard of porcelain and was handled with the sense that it might fall and shatter at any moment.

The sound held on for a few seconds, then climbed slowly upward in an aching reach for something it longed to touch but couldn't quite see. And then, as though the struggle had suddenly increased, the notes began to shiver and fade, and then without warning—

A squeak, a violent cry of protest from the violin strings—

Silence.

The bow was still in Sherlock's hand as he stared down at the instrument where it shone softly at him from the seat of the armchair. It didn't seem to mind that it was no longer being played, only at the abrupt stop that it had been subjected to, and now it lay there quietly, waiting for his decision. The polished wood was a warm gleam against the dark leather of the seat.

Sherlock was very still; his face had paled noticeably from even its normal pallor, and his grip remained white-knuckled along the handle of the bow. Under the folds of his dressing down, his chest was rising and falling more rapidly than a quiet night in that flat should have dictated. A long breath escaped his lips—a dark whisper of sound, though loud in the sudden stillness.

Eventually, slowly, as though barely aware of the movement, his hand fell, and the bow descended with it until both hung silently at his side. His eyes were still trained on the violin, but there seemed to be something out of place; they were dim, clouded with that same confusion that John had seen in them the previous day, and even further beneath that grew a flicker of hurt that, alone in the darkened room, Sherlock did not seem interested in hiding anymore. Another breath sought an exit, but this time he clenched his teeth, and all that emerged was a faint hiss of terrible bewilderment.

As though in sudden decision, the detective abruptly turned his back on the armchair and the violin. His eyes shuddered closed, his chin jerked upward a little, and for a long moment the only sound in the flat was that of Sherlock's own breathing—a bit too loud, a bit too forced, and the only thing that seemed to be keeping him from a far worse reaction.

The moment passed, and Sherlock's control seemed to have held, for a few seconds later he opened his eyes again, though they glanced only selectively around the room, lingering too long on the floor, the sofa, the window, and passing too quickly over the empty armchair and the desk against the wall. The detective took a hesitant step forward, then another to his left, and then another, his bare feet making no sound against the carpet, but the steps seemed to have no purpose except to give him something to think about. He ended up right back where he started. Staring at the violin.

Sherlock looked down. His hands were trembling.

The violin was not picked up again that night. The bow remained in Sherlock's clenched hand, as though he was afraid to let it go and see the true extent of the shivering of his fingers. By the time he ceased his slow pacing and finally collapsed, drained, onto the worn sofa, the embers of the fire on the other side of the room had long gone cold.

In the early hours of the morning, Mrs Hudson padded quietly upstairs with an extra blanket, which she draped gently over the detective's sleeping form. She watched him sadly for a moment, reached out a thin hand towards his hair, then drew it back again with a soft sigh and a shake of her head.

Only when she had gone did Sherlock open his eyes, but after a moment he merely curled up tighter under the blanket, huddling closer to the back of the sofa, and the silence stretched on.

* * *

_Thank you for taking the time to read! I look forward to hearing any thoughts you might have on this. :)_


	4. Part IV: Watching

**Author's Note: **Bit of a longer wait, but here we go! Thank you very kindly for all the support I've gotten for this story so far; it means a lot. :)

* * *

_Part IV: Watching_

Over the course of the three very long years that Sherlock had at one point begun to refer to as his 'hiatus' from his normal life's work, Mycroft Holmes had never once decreased his surveillance of Baker Street, and the building that was 221. He had considered it, briefly, upon the realisation that neither his brother nor John Watson would be spending any length of time there henceforth, but it was at this point that a familiar nagging sensation intervened and told him in no uncertain terms that he would probably end up regretting the removal of all his painstakingly-crafted security measures.

Mycroft was more than willing to listen to reason. The surveillance stayed.

It turned out that he didn't have to wait very long to realise the wisdom of his decision; he was able, during the first two weeks following the sensationalised suicide of Sherlock 'Boffin' Holmes, to keep a close and careful eye on John Watson—though what he observed was not at all pleasant to look at.

At first, he was unconvinced that John would ever recover from what had happened. The doctor would sit for hours at a time in his deep armchair, one hand kneading absently and unconsciously at his forehead, his eyes staring blankly into the space across from him that should have contained the lean, sprawling form of his friend and flatmate. It took some very firm words from Mrs Hudson to induce him to take care of himself, and though he did appear to force himself through the motions, Mycroft could tell even from behind a lens that he was only doing it to avoid the exhaustion of argument.

Even for Mycroft, the first few days were hard to watch—because he couldn't help but notice that, somewhere in vastness of the elegant house around him, Sherlock Holmes was doing much the same thing.

But not for the first time, John's willpower managed to take the elder Holmes by surprise. It was only the start of the second week when Mycroft observed John taking the plunge back into his working life at the surgery, and as the week progressed, he had it on very good authority that John was not only performing solidly and with his usual reliability, but had insisted that he was not in need of sympathy. It was at this point that Mycroft might have been inclined to regard developments with a certain degree of scepticism, except that John continued to give no indication that he was not pulling himself firmly together again. There was something almost superhuman about John Watson, sometimes, and a small part of Mycroft reeled a bit when he imagined how much strength the effort must be taking.

Whatever pain John was feeling, he had learned with much experience how to hide it, and hide it well. Even his therapist was of only marginal help at best, for John would say little to her except to confirm what might already be inferred. Something must have been slowly disintegrating under the strain, however: after the second week, 221B was empty.

In the many months that followed, Mycroft's eyes were to be found both at the old flat and at John's new residence; and, meticulous man that he was, he did not allow himself to become careless in either place. He did have the suspicion that John knew very well that _someone_ was keeping an eye on him, but whether he knew it was Mycroft or simply didn't care remained unclear. He went about his now-solitary life with a quiet determination that verged on defiance, and yet all the while continued to build walls around himself. After only one or two tries, Mycroft stopped sending the familiar black car around; it always came back empty.

Naturally, matters took a sharp turn following Sherlock's unexpected reappearance. Mycroft found himself very busy indeed, because on top of his usual day-to-day work (and there tended to be nothing usual about it) he was also keeping a very sharp eye on his brother, partly to ensure his safety, and partly to ensure that the public—and the media especially—were kept as thoroughly in the dark as possible. For once, the brothers were in agreement—it wasn't time yet, and they had to be very, very careful.

It was perhaps for this reason that it took nearly twenty-four hours for Mycroft to become aware of one very worrying fact: John Watson had left the flat at Baker Street for the second time.

To say he was taken by surprise was not strictly accurate; Mycroft was a pragmatic man, and was well aware that such a breach as had been put into place by Sherlock's alleged suicide and prolonged absence was not one that could be healed over the space of a day, a week, or even a month. There would inevitably be tension, unease, a sense of something out of place. This, he knew, was only to be expected, though when he had intimated as much to his brother, Sherlock had treated the notion with an air that was a bit too dismissive to be reassuring. But he had done what he could, for his part. Matters were slipping out of his hands.

This aside, Mycroft _was_ surprised when, after two days, John still had not returned—nor did he respond to any methods of communication, whether it was a call, a text, or the sleek government vehicle that Mycroft sent in pursuit later that week.

Sherlock wasn't answering, either. Mycroft frowned, straightened, and made the trip to Baker Street himself.

What he expected to find there, he wasn't quite sure, given his brother's erratic temperament; Mycroft remembered only too well the dark listlessness that had overcome Sherlock during the first week of his disappearance. It was with a distinct sense of foreboding, therefore, that he pushed open the door to the second-floor flat.

"Unless you've got information, Mycroft, get out."

One of Mycroft's eyebrows lifted in delicate, feigned offense. "You'll have to be more specific than that, Sherlock," he replied blandly. His eyes followed the thin form of his brother, looking for the signs he hoped weren't there. Restless, cyclical pacing, fingertips pressed to his lips, shadows under his eyes. Fully dressed, but shirt and trousers were wrinkled. Mycroft's gaze transferred slowly to the rest of the room. An empty mug, used, but on the left edge of the desk—John's, then. No other dishes or food in sight.

"You know perfectly well what I mean," Sherlock muttered back, already distracted again. He had stopped suddenly and was now staring into the cold fireplace, brows dark in concentration.

With a resigned breath, Mycroft shut the door neatly behind him. "How are you getting on, then?"

"Always ready, always one step ahead..." Sherlock hardly appeared to be listening, his lips moving in a steady whisper of monologue. Anyone else might have thought the detective was referring to himself, but Mycroft knew better.

"He's the most dangerous man in London at present," he broke in curtly. "What else did you expect?" His mouth thinned in bare amusement. "Cooperation?"

"No." Sherlock's head turned, and the brothers were suddenly face-to-face again, eyes meeting in less than a moment. Mycroft felt a tremor of something oddly akin to understanding pass between them. "No," said Sherlock again, softly, "I expected to be finished." He looked away.

"You knew when you started it wasn't going to be simple—especially with Moran."

"Yes, but I _didn't_ know that it would—"

"—that it would lead you back here," Mycroft finished for him.

Sherlock's dark head swung around again, eyeing his brother in surprise and suspicion; it was obvious that he hadn't expected that level of rapport. Because this wasn't so much about Moran anymore, Mycroft mused grimly, no; with Moriarty's right-hand man back in London, now it was about John, and Mycroft could see behind his brother's pale eyes and tight expression the battle he was waging—the one to keep John safe, and he was up against clock. It would only be a matter of time before Moran realised that, like his master, he could use John as a pawn against the man who was hunting him.

"In some ways he's even harder to find than Moriarty," Sherlock muttered irritably after a few seconds' pause. "At least Moriarty _wanted _to be found. Moran doesn't."

"My people are looking," Mycroft assured him.

But Sherlock made a soft noise of disgust. "Even your people are obvious, Mycroft. They won't be the ones to find him."

"Regardless..." Pursing his lips, Mycroft fixed his brother with a level stare. "That's not why I came here, Sherlock."

"Isn't it?" There was a note of delicate incredulity in the detective's question. "Fascinating. Should I ask why you did choose to lower yourself, then?"

"Where is John?"

The inquiry was very quiet, but one might have thought Mycroft had shouted as a complete silence descended. Sherlock had fallen very still, his head bowed as he resumed his stare toward the hearth. There was a tight control to his voice when he finally answered.

"He's gone. Left."

"I know," Mycroft responded curtly. "That's not what I asked you."

Sherlock remained silent, as though ignoring Mycroft might cause the other man to abruptly disappear, and Mycroft began to sense a tiny glimmer of what his brother must be going through at this moment. He shifted his weight slightly.

"Do you know where he is?"

"Of course I do," Sherlock shot back immediately, the words a harsh whisper. "You don't seriously think I would let him leave without making sure—"

"He's not safe there," said Mycroft softly.

"And what do you possibly expect me to do about that, Mycroft?" Sherlock demanded, whirling suddenly, his expression bleak and, behind it, a tremor of uncertainty. "Do you really think I'm not aware of that? In case you hadn't realised, I didn't drive him out; he _chose_ to leave, and I can hardly go knocking on his door when I'm supposed to be three years deceased, not to mention the fact that that damned Moran is still leading me a merry dance around the city."

They stared at each other, tension mounting, before Sherlock finally broke eye contact and jerked his gaze back to a spot somewhere near his feet. Though Mycroft kept his own expression as neutral as possible, he could feel a rising worry beginning to take hold, driving all other considerations to the back of his mind in its wake. Quite apart from that fact that Sherlock did not appear to have touched food since John's abrupt departure, it was clear that there was only a thin veil of control between the detective and his obvious desperation. With John absent, he had no one to turn to, nothing to come back to, and no one to temper the recklessness that tended to rise whenever frustration got the better of him.

Mycroft unobtrusively clenched his jaw. He would not envy Moran when Sherlock finally caught up to him, but until that moment of climax, Sherlock would be in even more danger from his own very volatile temperament.

"Have you gotten close to him?" he asked.

"Three times," Sherlock answered shortly, speaking to the wall now. "Twice in Manchester and once near Blackpool. He learned after that."

"And he knows you're here?"

"I would be _very_ surprised if it were otherwise. His movements haven't been random."

Silence fell. "So," Mycroft said a few seconds later, looking carefully down at the point of his umbrella now resting against the floor, "how did it happen, then? If you didn't drive John away from Baker Street, why did he leave?"

He didn't expect an appropriate reply, nor did he get one; Sherlock's answer was low and harsh—a blunt "Don't try to stick your nose in my affairs again, Mycroft."

Mycroft feigned deafness. "Will you go after him?"

"Why should I?"

"Because, brother," Mycroft went on, and his tone was suddenly more piercing, because he knew even as he said it that he was overstepping his bounds, "I think without John Watson you are very much in danger of reverting to the state you occupied three years ago."

His eyes flicked upward in time to watch something within Sherlock snap, and suddenly he was faced with a flashback to that day nearly three years before, when he had walked into one of the many rooms in the manor to find his brother with his hands clenched around the edge of the mantelpiece and a trembling of fury and helplessness passing in sharp spasms across his face. It was more controlled here, but only barely, and Mycroft resisted the automatic impulse to take a step backward.

"Get out, Mycroft." Sherlock's voice was tinged with something close to loathing. "Now."

Though he retained his cold composure, Mycroft inwardly felt that it was advisable, this time, to do as his brother said. He straightened, lifting his umbrella from the floor.

"Be careful, Sherlock," he said softly. "Even my resources have their limits."

Only when he was at the door did he turn around one more time and allow something more than bland neutrality to fade into his expression, and then, only for a moment. It wasn't likely to do any good, but at this stage, he had to force himself to try.

"I arranged for the burial of one corpse three years ago. I'd rather not have to do so again."


	5. Part V: Trying

**Author's Note: **Apologies for the wait on this update! Went to London for a few days, which was absolutely amazing, especially since I got to visit all the Sherlock-related spots, including Speedy's, Bart's, Baker Street, and the Tower of London. Anyway, on we go, and your thoughts and suggestions are always appreciated. :)

* * *

_Part V: Trying_

"You did _what_?"

Greg Lestrade's voice went up a few notches; his tone had bypassed bewilderment and incredulity and was now firmly encased in a coating of blank, utter shock.

John rubbed a hand over his eyes. "I've just said," he forced out, not quite meeting the Inspector's look. "I left. Few days ago."

"For God's sake, John," Lestrade groaned, still looking as though he would like to hear anything but this, "_why_? Why would you even _think_ about—?"

"Look, it wasn't what I wanted, either," John broke in, and he was annoyed to find in his words a desperate need to justify himself again. Fantastic. More evidence that he was still insecure about his decision.

Lestrade had dropped his head into one hand, kneading agitatedly at his forehead with thumb and forefinger and apparently trying to reconcile what he'd just been told with all that he knew of both Sherlock and John. The realisations, John thought, were probably not encouraging. Lestrade was one of the few—one of the _very _few—who knew of Sherlock's continued existence, and even that had taken some doing; Mycroft had been hesitant about informing him and Sherlock hadn't wanted to at all, but John had flatly overruled them both with the argument that, for one, they needed someone in the force they could rely on if word leaked out, and for another, the DI simply deserved to know. After all, John had pointed out, he'd put his job on the line more than once by letting Sherlock in on any number of cases, and again when he'd tried to defend the detective against the subsequent accusations that came out.

The signs of Lestrade's sacrifice still showed, in the lines on his face and the weary way he wrapped his fingers around his mug of coffee. It didn't make John feel any better about what had transpired, either.

"You know what he's like," he said quietly, running one finger along the edge of the café table. "We both do."

"Yeah, and I also know what he _used_ to be like before you came along and started humanising him."

John's eyebrows went up. "Humanising?"

"Okay, not the best word, but close enough." Lestrade shook his head dismissively. "The point is, you changed him, God knows how, but you did, and I'm not alone in thinking it was for the better. At least," he added with a grimace, "I wouldn't be if anyone else knew that he's still here."

"Hope it'll stay that way for a while," John muttered. "We're not prepared for that yet. So you're saying—what, like you think he's going to revert or something?"

Lestrade was looking at him seriously now. "Might be, yeah," he answered slowly. "I mean, you can never really tell, with him, but in this case..."

"In this case, I think we're a bit late." John leaned forward across the table, shoving his tea and sandwich out of the way. "Look, Greg, you haven't seen him—with good reason, I know, and I'm not blaming you for that—but you haven't, and I have. He's trying to make everything like it used to be, like nothing's _changed_. We both know it has, but for whatever reason, he's not admitting to it." He sighed and shook his head. "I can't live with him like that. I tried."

John hated saying it, but the moment he did he knew it was true. If Sherlock could be considered lost before John appeared in London, he had lost himself again over the three years that had now passed, and it was up to him, now, to find his way through that fog or... John swallowed. Or to lose himself further in it.

Lestrade looked pained. "If you'd just _talk_ to him—"

A quiet, humourless laugh came from John at that. "Great," he said, "you sound like Mrs Hudson. What do you think I tried to do? It was the talking that did it, finally, it was. I could _tell_ he didn't understand, and I'm honestly not sure he ever could."

"Yeah, well, 'course he can't. This is _Sherlock_ we're talking about, remember? I said you'd changed him—that being said, you haven't changed him _that_ much."

The words were uncomfortable, hitting home. John didn't answer, looking down at his mug, his plate, playing for time and with a corner of his half-eaten sandwich. Whatever notion it was that had convinced him talking to Lestrade would be a good idea, he was definitely regretting it right now. He didn't like to think of his avoidance and his defence as cowardice, but the way things were shaping up, it certainly looked that way.

"He's been on his own too long," he said quietly after a few moments of tense, awkward silence. "He's been so used to being alone, he doesn't know how to react when he comes back and it's all changed."

"Which," Lestrade went on pointedly, obviously taking advantage while he could, "is _exactly_ why he needs to _not_ be on his own now—"

"—and is also exactly why that can't be me," John finished flatly.

"Can't be anyone else."

"Then he's on his own."

Two stubborn pairs of eyes met across the table, but finally Lestrade let out a long sigh of mingled worry and resignation.

"You're gonna end up hurting him, John."

John picked up his tea. "I know," he murmured over the rim of the mug.

"I mean, a lot."

Then the retort came out before he could prevent it, and later, John could never quite forgive himself for the words. "Like he didn't do the same to me."

Lestrade leaned forward very suddenly, his chair scooting backward several inches. "Do _not_ tell me this is about revenge," he said loudly, the anger in his voice quickly rising. "_Don't_ tell me you're doing this just to get back at him for faking his own—"

The Inspector broke off in time, but there was still something frankly alarming in his expression, something grim and warning and protective. John grit his teeth and set his mug sharply down on the table again.

"Because you think I'd do that?" he demanded.

"I dunno, would you?"

John gave him a level look. "You know me better than that."

"If I did," Lestrade replied, leaning back again, "I wouldn't be surprised at you turning your back on him."

"For God's sake, I'm not _turning my back on him_, I'm just—"

But he stopped there. He was inwardly furious that Lestrade, always a force of calm and practicality and reason, had managed to drive him into this corner, but more than that, he was furious at himself to being utterly unable to admit that, yes, that was exactly what he was doing. Not to the purpose of any malicious intent, of course, but he had seen that Sherlock was hurting, and he had left. Greg Lestrade was not a man with the piercing insight of the Holmes brothers, but in his own quiet way he had done nearly as much for Sherlock as John had, and now, it appeared, it had come to the point where he was not about to let John forget that.

Lestrade said nothing this time, only folded his arms and regarded John evenly and expectantly as the doctor struggled to come up with some sort of defence; he had the air of a man who knew he was in the right and found no need to waste time or breath persuading anyone of it.

Finally, John let his shoulders slump forward. "I don't know," he muttered helplessly, "I don't know what I'm doing. All I know is, I've done it, and it is what it is, now."

The DI's expression softened a bit. "I think you're making a mistake, John, and I'm just trying to get you to realise that."

"Made a mistake," John corrected him dully. "Like I said, it's done."

"You can always go back—he's still at Baker Street, yeah?"

"Yeah, but"—John shook his head—"I can't just go back now. I don't _want_ to go back." There was a pause, and then he drained his tea and abruptly shoved back his chair. "Okay, well, I should get going."

"So soon?"

John gave a sort of half-shrug as he hastily pulled on his jacket. "Yeah, there are some—things I need to take care of—today would be good—" But he was rambling, distracted, and judging by the look on the other man's face, Lestrade had a fair idea, too, that it was just an excuse.

"Okay, but think about what I've said—just think about it." The Inspector's tone was a little too knowing for John's liking.

"Why?" Already a step or two away, John turned halfway back to look at Lestrade. "It's not going to change anything," he said shortly.

"Well, given time, it might."

"I doubt it." John pressed his lips together. "Thanks anyway."

"Can't say I didn't try," was Lestrade's only response, and John tried not to think about it too much as the café door swung shut behind him. He didn't _want_ to think. There was enough doubt infiltrating his mind as it was, and he had a bad feeling that if he considered things any more, he was liable to find that Lestrade was right about it all.

The sad fact was, he wasn't ready to admit that. Not yet. He only hoped to God that he hadn't been lying when he'd said that revenge had nothing to do with this—because when he dared to glance into his own heart, there was something still out of place, and what it was, he couldn't be sure.


	6. Part VI: Running

**Author's Note: **My _very_ sincere apologies for the lateness of this chapter. All I can say is that life, in all its hectic-ness and complications, got the better of me for a while. There's also the fact that this was perhaps the hardest chapter to write so far, because as much as I love Sherlock, I find him terribly difficult to write. I'm honestly still not convinced that I did him justice here, but I suppose it's just keep practising...

Thanks to all who have kept up, and I hope you enjoy. :)

* * *

_Part VI: Running_

Three weeks had passed since John had emptied his possessions from the flat at 221B, and it was rapidly becoming apparent that Mycroft's words to his brother were at once hitting home and somehow making no impression at all. The sitting room passed through alternating stages of existence; sometimes it was anxious, almost vibrant, as the detective moved through it in a flurry of deduction, pasting papers hurriedly against the mirror above the mantle and pacing in agitated circles from one end of the space to the other with his hands waving strange shapes about his head; and yet at other times it was a room of silence, a disaster area in the calm wake of the storm, and the only indication that the one figure occupying it was indeed living was the minute rise and fall of his thin torso as he lay, semi-conscious, on the worn sofa.

Something was happening in Baker Street—something that had never happened before—and if there was one thing Sherlock could be certain of amidst the quiet chaos, it was that he loathed the change more than he would ever admit to himself.

One of the few upsides to the whole situation was that he simply could not remain listless for any significant length of time, for the longer he waited, the more danger he knew he was subjecting John to, and that was one thing he refused to let happen. Colonel Sebastian Moran was formidable enough to begin with, when one considered that he was ex-army and, like John, had faced and survived the horrors of the Middle East, but couple that with the knowledge he was sure to have been privy to under Moriarty's direction, and he was indeed, as Mycroft had pointed out, the most dangerous man in London.

And if Moran suddenly decided to take a leaf from his old master's book and go after the one person that could stop Sherlock in his tracks, it would be Sherlock's fault for not eliminating the threat soon enough.

So it was that any time the flat was empty usually found Sherlock prowling the streets of the city, both day and night, relentlessly hunting down each wisp of information that might be a clue to lead him down the right path to Sebastian Moran. He went out without warning, often returning in the small hours of the next day with shadows under his eyes accentuating the paleness of his face, and with a tight, almost bitter set to his lips that said more clearly than any words that he had been unsuccessful yet again. He grew thinner, but either ignored the fact or found himself unaware of it; and as his cheeks paled, his eyes grew slowly brighter.

Had Mycroft been there, he might have found more than a little cause for concern, and would have set someone watching his brother in constant awareness that something could go wrong at any moment. Had Lestrade noticed what was happening, he would no doubt have set aside enough time from his work to make sure that Sherlock was not doing anything bordering on insanity, and perhaps would even have stayed with him during the long nights.

But the one person who could have turned it all around in a second remained firmly distanced, wrapping himself in the mundane routine of an ordinary life, keeping his own company through the same dark hours, and in the solitude of the second-floor flat there was no one to see what was happening to Sherlock Holmes.

* * *

The light began to show at the end of that third week, and for the first time in months Sherlock felt that his steadily-increasing exhaustion might indeed be paying off. Anthony—the boy he now could never disassociate from the night that John had given in—had done his work well, and had somehow managed to trace or stumble upon a lead too concrete to be ignored. After handing over a very generous sum of thanks, Sherlock had once again retreated to the flat, using the short time window he had been given to construct his plan of attack.

Every man, no matter how careful or how clever, had his own weakness or a set of them, and Moran's, Sherlock knew, was both a slight overconfidence and a fondness for cards. Whether the colonel had relaxed his guard after all this time or simply chosen to indulge a rare moment of pleasure was neither certain nor relevant; it was enough for Sherlock to have in his possession the name and location of a certain club where, it was rumoured, Moran had been spotted after (for him) a rather successful game.

Sherlock counted himself fortunate that Moran had only a loose sort of respect for the rules in this case, for it was only his supposed cheating that had gotten word of his presence out into the streets to begin with.

That being said, it was unlikely in the extreme that Moran would remain in the mentioned vicinity for very long, especially if he found himself unpopular. Sherlock had to move quickly.

* * *

In the end, the detective could only put it down to carelessness—the fact that he was still in the dark two streets away from his destination when he heard the sharp, reverberating crack of something much larger than a pistol and immediately flattened himself against the alley wall. The first bullet ricocheted off the bricks only a few inches right of his shoulder; the second one tore into his upper arm.

By that point, Sherlock was already running. The adrenalin rush carried him much further than he expected as he sprinted down the alleyways, cutting corners whenever he could, his features white and set against the pain. He had clamped a hand hard over his coatsleeve, but found himself oddly thankful that he couldn't feel the blood through his gloves—it would only serve as an additional distraction, and that was certainly the last thing he needed.

He paused only when he found himself gasping for breath, flinging himself into a crevice between two buildings and sinking into an exhausted crouch against the wall. He breathed, swallowed, breathed again, then closed his eyes and let his ears do the surveillance work for a few seconds as he fought for mental and physical mastery. It was very long in coming—too long, he thought—and began to occur to him that his lifestyle of the past few weeks had done him very few favours in the long run.

It was when he finally eased his coat down over one shoulder and probed the wound on his arm more extensively that he realised he wasn't going to be able to let this one slide. He certainly couldn't treat himself one-handed. But he was close to Moran now, he knew, so hatefully close, and the sooner his arm was in working condition again, the better for him—and the worse for the colonel.

He needed help. And with John out of reach, there was only one person he could turn to.

* * *

"I, erm, don't suppose I should really ask..." Molly said, glancing up once at Sherlock's face before turning her eyes back to the bandage she was wrapping expertly around his upper arm. Her hand was cold against his skin.

"Ask what?" Sherlock replied irritably; he was steadily ignoring the pain, which had started to prove more difficult than he remembered. "And no, you shouldn't."

Molly reached for another layer of bandages; Sherlock could see her biting her lip out of the corner of his eye. " I mean about, erm... who's shooting—at you?"

"Someone _very_ desperate, I hope," he muttered.

"Oh... right."

She let the subject drop there—thankfully, for Sherlock was not at all inclined to discuss his current work practises with her, if they could even be labelled as such. Whether she truly had an idea of what he'd been up to he had not yet discerned, but then, he had given the matter little thought; set up against everything else, it was hardly a pressing concern. Still, he was fortunate to have found her here so late, after her usual hours.

He was sitting on one of the hospital counters, his shirt, jacket, and coat tossed over a nearby stool, and he was waiting with rapidly decreasing patience as Molly tended to the proof of his carelessness. The various substances that she had cleansed the wound with—water, iodine, saline—were still stinging, and Sherlock breathed a low, barely-voiced hiss as the bandages tightened around the area. Molly noticed, her hands faltering and her face turning quickly towards his, but he gave her a sharp, irritated glance in return and she quickly continued with the dressing. Silence filled the dim hospital room, broken only by the faint rubbing sound of the gauze and the distant hum of the central heating.

"I hear John's—left."

Oh, _hell_.

"Not really looking for conversation, Molly, thank you."

For once, though, his caustic tone seemed to have lost some of its potency, because there was only a few seconds of quiet before she went on again. Her tone was odd, too—still with the habitual hesitancy, but something firm lying underneath, as if she was being driven to keep talking while she had him here.

"He's—well, he's never done that... before," she commented. "Unless there was, erm, another time I didn't hear about."

Sherlock remained looking straight ahead. "No."

"So... what—what happened?"

There was a soft rattle of metal as she reached for the bandage scissors, and he felt the tension ease slightly on his arm as the excess wrapping was snipped away. "How long until it needs to be changed?" he asked curtly, sliding down from the counter.

"Every day, if you think you—"

"I'll come back tomorrow."

Neither of them spoke as Molly awkwardly helped him to pull his shirt on again. Her cheeks were flushed, likely unconsciously, and it was a relief when she finally stepped away and let him finish the task himself. His jacket and coat he flung carelessly over one arm; he would put them on outside, if only to avoid a repeat performance. He was nearly to the door when her voice caught his attention again.

"You should find him."

Sherlock stopped, but did not turn. "I already know where he is."

"N-no, I mean, you should... go after him."

He did turn, this time, and was somewhat startled to see a rare and yet somehow familiar expression on Molly's face—that knowledge or sudden flash of insight that he still could not quite bring himself to expect from her. His own features remained neutral. "Why?"

"Because—it's just not right, is it? I mean, you're _together_—n-not like that," she added quickly, the pink spots on her cheeks growing brighter, "but just... like you should be. Except you're not, now. Because," she added, astounding him by the sheer fact that she was still talking, "I saw him while you were, you know, away, and—and I don't know what he said, to you, or why he left—but it's the last thing he needs." She nodded, shakily. "Really."

They stared at each other for what seemed like an absurdly long time, but it was perhaps only a few seconds before Molly obviously realised how much she had said and looked away, her hands twisting in front of her. "Okay, well, erm... I'll see you, then."

He nodded, she smiled (wanly), and he left.

But three streets further on, her stammering little speech was still chasing its way through his head—because the truth was a stark and terrible thing, sometimes, and even someone who valued it as much as Sherlock could not always look it square in the face. _It's just not right, is it?_

No, he thought, it wasn't right. It was all wrong.


	7. Part VII: Hearing

**Author's Note: **So - real life ate me for a while. A long while, I'm afraid to say, and I do offer my apologies for that. This story is challenging enough in that it's relatively unexplored territory, for me personally and I think within the _Sherlock_ fandom in general (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on the latter score).

I also blame that fact that I'm now adding_ Doctor Who_ to my list of fandoms.

But with Season III shooting already started, my mind is once again reverting to _Sherlock_ mode, so thank you all who have kept up with this so far! More to come. :)

* * *

_Part VII: Hearing_

Each day, John immersed himself in his work at the surgery, for there lingered at the back of his mind the desperate, impossible idea that if he just buried himself deeper and deeper into the work of fixing other people's problems, he would somehow justify being unable to rectify his own. He was more aware than ever of his responsibility in these scenarios—that he literally held lives in his hands at times, and after each successful session he revelled in the fleeting sensation that he had done something meaningful and good and had perhaps turned someone's life around. It was such a _good_ thought. He clung to it.

Whether his patients, and their friends and family, had any inkling that their surgeon needed these sessions almost more than they did themselves, he couldn't tell. He certainly didn't ask; but whenever he passed a mirror he quickly turned his head away, because he knew he didn't want to see the man opposite, with his tight-set lips and his hollow, curtained glance.

The upside to this near-exhausting lifestyle was that he could return to his empty little flat—and oh, God, how empty it really was—and he would be too worn out to do much but fix himself tea and eat something a bit later. He just didn't have to _think_ too much, and at this stage it was one of the few blessings he had any faith in.

One of the others was that he slept dreamlessly most nights, and when he did dream, he remembered little—only vague, uneasy implications of having lost something without quite realising when it happened. This came as no surprise to him, and he dealt with it as best he could until it became little more than a dull ache that he barely noticed.

And as time passed, each day and each night became very much like the next, and he tried not to entertain the thought that he was slipping onto a freeway going nowhere, dropping down from some higher plane of existence for the simple reason that he'd _chosen_ to do so.

It hit him hard the night when he realised it was the third time he'd made that choice.

He had gone to bed as per usual, his thought processes dull and weary and simply ready to sink into nothingness for six or seven hours. It had taken him no longer than he expected to get to sleep, and as he felt himself drifting off he anticipated nothing more than awaking the next morning to the shrill beeping of his phone alarm.

But it wasn't the phone that jerked him into panicked consciousness in the dark of his little room.

It was the silence.

He came to with an incredibly loud hiss of breath, his eyes flying open, darting and flickering and staring for something to grab onto, and finding nothing. Beneath the thin sheet, his chest rose and fell with the urgency of someone who had just barely escaped the line of fire, except that there had been no gunshots, no cries, no _dreams_—

The fact that he didn't even know why he was awake was what scared him the most. It was as though his unconscious mind had sensed something and tore him from his sleep out of sheer desperation, only to show him—nothing. And because of that, fear rose inside of him, and it was the kind of fear he had never in all his time in the service learned how to deal with.

In the space of half a second, John had lurched himself violently into a sitting position, and even though the rustle of the sheets seemed loud, it was a volume that had been muffled as though his ears were stuffed with cotton—but why couldn't he hear? He stared down blindly at his hands in front of him, those trembling bits of him that he could feel but couldn't see, digging their nails deep into the twists of his bedding.

But there was something else, his brain pushed on irrationally, something so close that it was very nearly in his head. What was it that he couldn't notice, that someone didn't _want _him to notice, like they were trying to be kinder by keeping him in the dark, but no, he wanted to _know_—and then he was forcing the breaths again because somehow he was being trapped, pinned down by the silence itself, like it was a living enemy to which he had awoken with no way out.

He sat there, frozen and vulnerable and shaking, and all the while his breath became louder and louder and more distant from his own voice until he could stand it no longer.

Abruptly he stumbled from his bed, with short, jerky movements as he struggled to disentangle himself from the sheets, and yet he barely noticed them clinging, because above all else in his mind was the terrible hum of the silence, threatening to overwhelm him. He tripped over something on the floor and it didn't matter; all that mattered was that he was slipping and drowning in the midst of the dark and the quiet and he needed to stop but _oh, God, what if he couldn't—?_

There were harsh, painful gasps coming from his lips by the time he fumbled his way into the next room, too panicked to search for a lightswitch because it was the silence more than the dark that was throbbing against his senses. His breath kept catching, tightening in his chest each time he sought for more air. He thought he cried out, but he never knew for sure.

He bumped hard into the back of the sofa and felt a stab of relief in the midst of his panic; felt his way quickly around to the other side, then bent towards the table and scrabbled wildly for a few seconds before his hand clamped over the remote to the television. He pressed a myriad of wrong buttons before he found enough sense to flip the remote right-side up and try again.

Light, then sound—_voices_.

John was beyond caring what programme he had just turned on; all he knew was that he could hear things again, things beyond the tightness of his breath that, in the last few moments, had become a string of choked, frantic sobs.

He slumped, suddenly exhausted and gasping with relief, into the sofa that luckily had enough give to accommodate that. The remote fell from his now-loosened fingers onto the cushion next to him, but he was too busy staring upward and trying to control his rapid breathing to notice or care. He shut his eyes after a moment, feeling the light changing through his eyelids as the telly flickered from one shot to the next. For once, he was incredibly glad how bright the screen was, and how loud the voices echoed in the tiny flat.

He's forgotten what silence could do to a person.

Sherlock liked silence—Sherlock immersed himself in it far more often than anyone could consider healthy. But John, who had spent too many hours in a battle zone and even more on the never-sleeping streets of London, had found over the years that sleeping in silence was utterly unbearable. He couldn't do it anymore; all his instincts rebelled against it.

Which was fine, normally. Fine until his mind forced rationality out the window.

By the time he dragged himself from the brink and back to reality, the trembling of his body was coming not from fear, but from exhaustion, and from the retreat of an adrenalin rush so potent that it took him two tries to get on his feet again. He swayed and pressed a hand to his forehead, fingers pulling wearily at his brows as they tried to stave off the headache he knew was inevitable.

He slept on the sofa the rest of the night, retrieving a tumbled blanket from his bedroom and pulling it without much thought over himself. The telly stayed in the background, as loud and as bright as when he'd turned it on, because if it was a choice between uncertain sleep and sleeping in silence, John knew without hesitation the one he preferred.


	8. Part VIII: Sinking

**Author's Note:** The wait may be long, but the chapters are still coming, I promise! This was to date the most difficult chapter to write; I just can't get into Sherlock's head as well as I'd like. Ah, well.

Special thanks to **Esther Kirkland** for giving me the final motivational push to get this one up sooner rather than later. I needed that, Essie!

* * *

_Part VIII: Sinking_

_Run—keep running…_

His shoes slapped hard against the slick pavement, louder than he liked, but the time had passed in which silence was his most valuable ally.

_Faster… faster… faster…_

He sensed the corner before he came to it, rounded it tightly, and pushed off again from a slight ridge near the alley wall.

_Losing him—_

The mere thought sent a surge of adrenalin through his system; gritting his teeth, dashing rainwater from his eyes, he spurred forward, all his senses tingling with awareness and a need to anticipate. There was a pain in his chest he didn't remember, but he forced it to the edge of his consciousness, like the dismissed aggravation of a biting gnat.

He could not afford distractions. Not now. Not when he was _so close_.

Breathing raggedly, he veered to the other side of the alley, dashed around another corner, and found that he had very suddenly lost the lamplight. For a moment, his eyes were met with a wall of blackness, and he came to an unwilling halt.

_Hell._

His ears strained, and for a few half-panicked seconds he could hear nothing but the rain spitting gently on the pavement beneath his feet, and the distant whine of two—no, three—auto engines. His chest rose and fell, shaking with the knowledge that each precious second he spent standing here was another moment in which Moran could drop into darkness and disappear from view, indefinitely.

Somehow, he had got to thinking that this was it—his last chance to make things right, to cut off the final, most dangerous piece of Moriarty's old underworld regime. Then, and only then, would he be able to return to Baker Street, breathing easier, and attempt to fix what had all gone wrong with John. One thing at a time, he was forced to remind himself; for so adept was he at focussing all his attention on a single goal that when his priorities suddenly became divided neatly in two, he had floundered and hesitated and lost the drive that would have made rectifying either them possible.

And it had cost him. It had cost him the life he had wanted when he finally stepped from behind the veil of the grave, the life he had been looking forward to for three years because it was the only bit of light that had still reached him in his darkest, most desperate hours. Everything he had done, he had done so that he could return—only to find that, when he did, the things he had needed most had vanished. John's eyes were clouded, and the flat was silent.

John was gone.

It was fortunate that he did not have to dwell on this line of thought any longer; a muffled thud reached his ears, barely audible, and yet closer than he had really expected; and it was enough for him to break into run again—across an open stretch of pavement, around the dark, damp silhouette of an old warehouse, his eyes wide and straining in the blackness. Even as he sprinted, however, a grim sort of thrill shivered its way through his thin form. He knew this place—and it was a dead end.

The alley opened up very suddenly again, to what he knew was a broad, paved space encircled by old, industrial one- and two-story buildings, partially barricaded by cold metal railings. There was a security light at the far edge, though white and faint and flickering, as if it might go out any moment, and it did little more than rebound from the grey wall of the recess it had been set into.

It had gone quiet again. Sherlock drew in a slow, silent breath and carefully eased the gun from his pocket to the palm of his hand.

"Moran!"

He threw his voice as far as he could away from his current position, but for added security slipped sideways into a deeper area of shadow.

He knew it was a risk, and half expected a shot to shatter the silence any second now; but he was not surprised, either, when none came. Moran was being careful now, too clever to take the off-chance of hitting his opponent when it would give away his own position in the process.

Sherlock shifted again, readjusting his grip on the handgun; it must be the chill that was causing that faint tremor through his wrist and fingers. "I don't have to kill you, colonel!" he called out.

But he was met still with silence. They both knew the words were a lie; Moran was far too dangerous to be kept alive at this point, and with his master long-dead, he would be of little use in custody anyway.

The shivering was growing stronger, fluttering through the muscles of his arms now, towards his shoulders. His chest felt suddenly hollow, and he drew in a sharp breath as though to fill the emptiness of his lungs. Angrily, he blinked rainwater again from his eyes and clenched his teeth together, mind and body defying the tremors, and only partially succeeding.

Silence stretched on. There was no flicker of movement across the way, no slightest scrape of a boot heel against the pavement. And the rain kept coming, too-gently, little more than a fine mist hanging in the air between Sherlock and his final opponent.

Even wrapped firmly around the gun, his hands were visibly shaking. He didn't know why.

Features pale and set, he started moving again, edging as quickly as he dared along the perimeter of the open area, flattening himself against the cold stone-and-mortar buildings whenever his eyes tricked him into discerning a breath of movement. Or _had_ something shifted over there?

He stopped again, lifting his chin, readying himself and taking a firmer grip on the gun. He would get one chance and one chance only, and he needed to be absolutely certain that he would not need another one—

But this waiting had quite suddenly become agony. He needed to end this. _Now_.

He turned sharply, levelled the gun—and too late saw the split-second gleam of metal only feet from where he stood. His eyes widened, and it flashed through his mind in the bare moment following that _Oh, God, he was going to die. _

The shot was so close that his ears rang, and he felt its results almost immediately: white-hot pain burying itself deep in the flesh of his left side, just below the ribs. Gasping, he stumbled back, hit the wall with a painful thud, and collapsed to the damp pavement as his legs folded suddenly beneath him. He could feel water seeping through his shirt and trousers—but not nearly as rapidly as the blood was. The gun had clattered to the ground somewhere to his right.

Footsteps sounded abruptly nearby, making a quick and soon to be untraceable exit. Sherlock swore, but the sound didn't come.

Though he had no clue where he found the strength, he forced his head up, craning to see with slightly blurred vision into the darkness ahead of him. The night seemed faintly askew, tilting this way and that as he struggled to keep his gaze level. Moments later, his head sank forward heavily again, unable to go on—and yet he was almost entirely certain that in the wake of Moran's retreat, a second figure had slipped past, and followed.

Belatedly, Sherlock pressed both hands to his side, though they were shaking so badly that it did very little to staunch the bloodflow. His head lolled to the side of its own accord; it would not be long before he slipped into unconsciousness. Days, weeks, months of too much strain and too little concern for his own well-being were finally catching up to him.

It took much longer than it should have for him to realise, dimly, then with growing confusion, that he should have been dead by now.

In fact, he should have been dead almost the instant that the bullet entered his body, because it should not have hit him where it had in the first place. And because it was utterly inconceivable that Moran should have missed at that distance…

Sherlock doubled over, coughing, and with one unsteady hand fumbled for his mobile in his coat pocket. Miss or not, he would still die here if he didn't get assistance.

"_Sherlock?_"

In between shallow, uneven breaths, he was able to give his location. And not for the first time, he had to give Mycroft credit for sounding perfectly calm during their short and, on Sherlock's end, ragged conversation.

Almost before the screen had gone dark again, the phone was on the ground; Sherlock's hand was once again pressed against his side, using a few thick folds of coat to catch the red still seeping through. Head still bowed, fighting for consciousness, he waited.


End file.
